Pixar Releases New Details on “Coco”

In 2012, Pixar announced the inclusion of Coco in their upcoming lineup. Now, Coco will be the only original film in Pixar’s lineup that currently consists of Cars 3, The Incredibles 2, and Toy Story 4. Little has been known about the plotline of Coco, except for the setting of Mexico and how the story will revolve around Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). Prevously, Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich and producer Darla K. Anderson, and Adrian Molina as co-director. After patiently waiting for more news and information, EW traveled to the Pixar studios and have new details to share with eagerly-awaiting fans.

Coco will be filled with music as the film:

“…follows the secret musical ambitions of Miguel, who resides in a lively, loud Mexican village but comes from a family of shoemakers that may be the town’s only music-hating household. For generations the Riveras have banned music because they believe they’ve been cursed by it; as their family history goes, Miguel’s great-great-grandfather abandoned his wife decades earlier to follow his own dreams of performing, leaving Imelda (Miguel’s great-great-grandmother) to take control as the matriarch of the now-thriving Rivera line and declare music dead to the family forever.”

“But Miguel harbors a secret desire to seize his musical moment, inspired by his favorite singer of all time, the late Ernesto de la Cruz. It’s only after Miguel discovers an amazing link between himself and De la Cruz that he takes action to emulate the famous singer and, in doing so, accidentally enters the Land of the Dead.

In the beautiful underworld, it’s not long until Miguel encounters the souls of his own family — generations’ worth of long-dead but no less vivacious Rivera ancestors, including great-grandmother Imelda. Still, given the opportunity to roam around the Land of the Dead, Miguel decides to track down De la Cruz himself. He teams up with another friendly (and skeletal) spirit — a trickster named Hector, voiced by Bernal — to find De la Cruz, earn his family’s blessing to perform, and return to the Land of the Living before time runs out.”

Left to Right: Darla K. Anderson and Lee Unkrich

Benjamin Bratt (Ernesto de la Cruz) and Gael Garcia Bernal (Hector) have been tapped to star in the film, along with newcomer Anthony Gonzalez who will portray Miguel. As Miguel’s scratch voice in early development, Gonzalez was ultimately hired by the filmmakers. Renee Victor has also been added to voice Abuelita (Miguel’s grandmother). Having an all-Latino cast was important to Unkrich and is happy with the current cast, which features a mix of actors from Mexico and Los Angeles. Bringing this cast together was no easy task, as Unkrich outlined. According to him, Bratt was interested in the project very early on, but Bernal was considered early on, but it wasn’t until his involvement in Mozart in the Jungle that the filmmakers knew John Lasseter would agree to the casting. Similar to Auli’i Cravalho of Moana, Gonzalez was discovered from a nationwide search, replacing the original Miguel who is now 17 or 18 years of age. Unkrich said the current age of the original Miguel shows just how long the movie has been worked on.

The current release date of Coco is November 22, 2017, so much more news will be on it’s way in the meantime.

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